The Jester Race is the best album from In Flames era pure Melodic Death Metal, unfortunately for the fans of this precise style, that would also be the last. The Swedish band was still playing a lot of acoustic almost classical music, and was still very close to its alter ego Dark Tranquillity. Honestly I love both "versions" of In Flames music and it's obvious for me that their "pre-Whoracle" work reached its climax with the album The Jester Race.

As a general statement, the entire album is darker than any other In Flames albums and, incredible as it may seem, it's also the most melodic. Just listen to the splendid opener 'Moonshield' or the masterpiece 'The Jester Race' and you'll get it. 'The Jesters Dance' is a great instrumental track [probably the best In Flames instrumental] and also a recurrent melody for the title track. However, one of my favorites is still track 3, 'Artifact Of The Black Rain', a genuine ID of what In Flames was in 1995: innovation, huge melodies, great riffs, all of that was already in that song.

But one of the most surprising songs is 'December Flower', which happens to be a perfect definition for the phrase "melodic death". And, of course, the level of brutality is also very high on songs such as 'Dead God In Me' or 'Dead Eternity'. So what we have here is an excellent album with several influences.

With The Jester Race, In Flames manages to catch listeners and to make them travel through the dark lands of their Melodic Death Metal world. Great compositions such as 'The Jester Race', 'Moonshield', 'Artifacts Of The Black Rain' and 'Lord Hypnos' must appeal to everyone of you one day. So why don't you try today?

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Haha, Adjuchas Shaman just made me laugh my ass off with some of the descriptions... But the thing's funny and sad at the same time... I can't believe what In Flames turned out to be ... Anyway, this album is one of the highlights of melodeath, and it's fuckin awesome! All the songs are killers, especially Moonshield, The Jester's Dance, Artifacts of the Black Rain, Dead Eternity and Wayfaerer...
But, there's something weird about Graveland... It has some of the best lyrics I've ever heard, and since I read them, it's one of my favourite tracks... It's weird, because I know it's clearly not the best one...